


you've got your leather boots on

by Blake



Series: 30 Days of Depeche Mode Bagginshield ficlets [2]
Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Established Relationship, Everybody Lives Nobody Dies, M/M, On the Road Again, The Shire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-16
Updated: 2020-04-16
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:07:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23679622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blake/pseuds/Blake
Summary: Thorin's outfit brings back some memories.
Relationships: Bilbo Baggins/Thorin Oakenshield
Series: 30 Days of Depeche Mode Bagginshield ficlets [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1705147
Comments: 4
Kudos: 94





	you've got your leather boots on

They’re not five miles from Bag End when Bilbo twists his ankle. It’s not his fault. Aside from the giant unexpected hole in the ground, there’s the fact that he can’t exactly watch where he’s going when Thorin looks so utterly distracting. After several months of Thorin growing comfortable in Bilbo’s home with little need for more than shirts and bare feet, or socks and a knitted jumper on a frosty morning, Bilbo has forgotten the commanding figure Thorin cuts in his full dwarfish attire.

Thorin offers to carry him to Bree, where they’ll hire some ponies to take them to visit family in Erebor. Thankfully, Bilbo’s tongue _(“Oh, so that’s how it is to be, then? Am I to be your prized conquest to show off every time we return to Erebor?”)_ is quicker than his baser instincts _(take me now; sling me across your broad, strong shoulders and cart me around like something precious; save my useless, insignificant self from danger like I’m an inconvenient burden.)_

Perhaps Bilbo had grown more restless than he’d realized in Bag End, with all its judgmental neighbors and narrow fences, and the quiet simplicities that Thorin thrust himself into with such sweet and surprising dedication.

“Do you know,” Bilbo starts with some subtlety, squinting into the morning horizon and definitely not watching the sure, steady footfalls of Thorin’s steel-toed boots striking the ground, “I do believe that the last time we were on this trail together, you would have picked me up and tossed me over your shoulder like a sack of flour, just to prevent me from slowing you down.” Bilbo’s breath runs short as he says it, most likely due to the incline of the hill they’re climbing. 

Thorin’s laugh is almost silent. “The last time we were on this trail together, I would have done no such thing, as I was terrified to touch you.”

Bilbo’s stomach drops, despite himself. “Did you think I was diseased?” he accuses, because he has found that deliberate and acute misinterpretation is the best way to set the truth free from Thorin’s lips.

“I feared I might not be able to stop.”

“Touching me?”

“Yes.”

Bilbo limps along for a few more quiet steps, looking around the wide-open meadow in a futile search for a dark corner to kiss the lovely, somber regret off his lover’s face. “Could you now?”

“Touch you?” Thorin asks, something like incredulity carving a hollow in his voice.

Bilbo’s mind swims with memories of Thorin’s hands all over him as they dressed that morning, of Thorin’s hand pulling him up from a sheer cliff and certain death. “Stop?”

Thorin never grows impatient, but he has gotten better at recognizing that Bilbo’s tongue is quicker than his baser instincts. Bilbo soars into the air as he’s hoisted face-first over Thorin’s shoulder. The air gets knocked out of him as his waist cuts into the thick furs of Thorin’s cloak and Thorin’s arm constricts tightly around his thighs. “You are a nuisance,” Thorin tells him fondly.

Bilbo’s head is rushing with blood, but it’s worth it for the leather-and-metal smell of the clothes he rubs his cheek against. He wraps his arms loosely around the chest in front of him and thinks that it’s quite nice to be journeying once again with Thorin Oakenshield.


End file.
